


To Capture Light

by Vulpesmellifera



Series: Craquelure [1]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Canada, Christmas, Don't copy to another site, Light Angst, M/M, Mystrade Advent Calendar, Mystrade Advent Calendar 2018, Mystrade Holiday 2018, POV Mycroft Holmes, Post-Season/Series 04, Snowed In, Unexpected Visitors, Wapiti, mystrade
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-14
Updated: 2018-12-14
Packaged: 2019-09-18 06:35:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,891
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16989870
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vulpesmellifera/pseuds/Vulpesmellifera
Summary: The watercolor painting on his studio table mimics the sunset: stains of color running into one another, edges blurring and lines saturating around coin-sized pools of wet pigment. He watches as the gleam of color dulls into a dry matte, and he thinks of how his own life is doing the same. A drying out of the steadfast and glorious career of Mycroft Holmes, his covert accomplishments disintegrating into the bones of an archaeological dig that no one will ever even think to fund.Mycroft Holmes has sequestered himself in a desolate part of the world as he struggles with the consequences of the events at Sherrinford. He is confronted with the unexpected when a visitor appears on his doorstep.





	To Capture Light

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first contribution to any fandom, and I hope you enjoy it. 
> 
> Many, many thanks to my beta [notjustmom](https://archiveofourown.org/users/notjustmom/pseuds/notjustmom), who took the chance on a new writer - I am most grateful!
> 
> I'm an American, and apologize in advance for a lack in Britishisms.

Lifting the mug to his lips and taking a sip, he sputters when he realizes the water has a funny taste; it isn’t his tea.

Disbelieving, he stares at the cup of murky water. The rinse water for his paintbrushes. He knows it’s a common occurrence among watercolorists, but never before has it happened to Mycroft Holmes.

He places the cup on the table, and his hand trembles as he does it. He huffs, pulls at his collar with the offending hand, and shifts his gaze to the window. The great expanse of sky is blue-violet, with slips of pink bleeding into the yellow sun as it dips behind the Canadian Rockies to the west. Every move of his is calculated, deliberate, -or, at least, it had been before the events at Sherrinford. Rigid control without stiffness; his movements were more of a series of purposeful slides in the liminal space between thought and action; a dance of confidence and easy prestige.

The watercolor painting on his studio table mimics the sunset: stains of color running into one another, edges blurring and lines saturating around coin-sized pools of wet pigment. He watches as the gleam of color dulls into a dry matte, and he thinks of how his own life is doing the same. A drying out of the steadfast and glorious career of Mycroft Holmes, his covert accomplishments disintegrating into the bones of an archaeological dig that no one will ever even think to fund.

His mother’s scolding rings in his ears and feels like it would split open his chest if he let it. His brother’s pity would spill like salt into the wound. Eurus would crow, would have rung the bells like the knells at a funeral if she had been privy to that family meeting.

After the dressing down by his parents, he had withstood a dressing down and psychological evaluation from the other powers-that-be at work. It lead to this “sabbatical,” spending his days and nights haunting a sparsely furnished chalet in the Rockies of British Columbia. The chalet has an A-frame build on the back overlooking the mountains. There are floor to ceiling windows and a piano and fireplace. The bedrooms number four; the master bedroom with an ensuite. The kitchen is updated and spacious. The fridge is near empty, but Mycroft subsists mostly on tea, cigarettes, and frozen vegetables.

He’s brought his oil paints and his watercolors. He’s brought clothes enough for a week. Fine cashmere jumpers over silk button downs. Sherlock would laugh at his chinos. No ties. No waistcoats. There is no service to wash his clothes; in this, the second week, he wears the same outfits, proving fastidious in his showers but careless in his sartorial cleanliness.

Twice, he has driven down the mountainside and into town, seeing streetlamps decked with green garland and red bows. He drives himself now, having lost the privilege of a private car. He’s let his ginger hair curl without product, and once, a look in the rearview mirror reminded him that he had forgotten to shave. The beard distracted from the moles on his face and softened the sharpness of his nose. Though he still wears an expensive, long coat and fine leather gloves, he feels sure most people in London would no longer recognize him.

He’d picked up pastries and eggs and more packages of frozen vegetables in the market, silently cursing the pop holiday songs playing overhead. He’d told the lady at the bakery that his name was “Mike”, and that he was on retreat, getting away from the holiday hubbub so he could focus on his work. Her eyes had twinkled and she slipped an extra piece of sponge cake into his bag, wishing him good luck on his work and bidding him to come by again early to get a fresh baked apple pie.

Her kindness still moves under his skin like a splinter, and he shifts in his studio seat, as if trying to rub away the things she makes him feel - pathetic. Pining.

He remembers Sherlock deducing that he was lonely.

“Pish,” Mycroft had said then as he drove from town back to the empty chalet. He repeats it now. “Pish.”

 

* * *

 

At night, he pours himself whiskey, stokes the fire, and sits in the great leather chair beside it (so like his own at home), and sips the whiskey as thoughts ebb and any feeling abates. He avoids going to bed until he’s so tired he nearly misses a step and falls on the stairs.

He’d dreamt the first night, and every night thereafter. There are variations on a theme. Most often, Eurus hands him a gun, and he turns, pointing it at Sherlock. He shoots him in his heart, his brother’s blood falling from his chest like glittering droplets of alizarin crimson. John laughs in that stupid, shrill giggle, and the giggle is the color burnt sienna.

Mycroft sometimes jumps from his bed, his ears filled with the ringing of his own screams, his back soaked and the sheets still clutched in his shaking hands.

 

* * *

 

There is comfort in the stroke of the paintbrush against the canvas and the pungent scent of oil paints. It’s been two weeks, and he’s filled the studio with small canvases depicting gray mountains and cotton-candy sunsets. He doesn’t look too closely at the paintings. He sees her face in them, sometimes a little girl who might have enjoyed the taste of cotton candy, and sometimes a grown woman watching from the woods like a witch waiting to ensnare a stray. While the oil canvases litter the floor, watercolors hang from string along the walls, all aglow in the soft light from the north facing windows.

Painting is about catching light, he had read. It’s about the interplay between light and shadow, and from there, you bring in shapes and color.

He’d thought himself an architect of events, the artist with an endless palette. Now, he understands that he’s been relegated to the negative space between objects, and life forms around him without his assent, light and shadows both.

 

* * *

 

The unexpected comes with a _knock knock knock_ at the door. Mycroft shuffles over, wondering if he should carry a weapon. Anthea knows where he’s hiding, and possibly Lady Smallwood, but he’s been particularly careful in maintaining his anonymity out here.

He opens the door to find Greg Lestrade standing on the other side. The silver-haired man looks like he belongs here in the mountains, striking in his steel grey parka against the backdrop of snow and pine.

“Detective Inspector?” Mycroft grimaces when his voice croaks upon speaking. He looks at the clues before him: flight from Heathrow, middle seat, then a car ride out with bags packed for a week’s stay. Coffee from a Tim Horton’s on the way to the chalet. He smells heavily of cigarettes.

Greg shrugs at him. “I almost didn’t believe it, myself.” His gaze sweeps over Mycroft’s clothes.

Mycroft remembers that he doesn’t quite look himself. He swallows, and rolls back his shoulders, lifting his chin. “Why are you here?”

“Figured you had me out after Sherlock enough times over the years, that I ought to help him and return the favor.” Greg says. The lines on his face are creased, and his smile tremulous, but to have come all this way, the man seems earnest in his intention to…to what? Help Mycroft? Spend time with him as if they were friends? Satiate his curiosity about what Mycroft had become?

“And you’ve ignored all my calls.”

“Where are you staying?”

Greg looks up at the chalet and around at the mountains. “I was kind of hoping you’d invite me in.”

Mycroft frowns, and for once, finds himself at a loss for words.

Greg blinks at him. But he comes in carrying his bags.

 

* * *

 

Mycroft realizes he’s shaking when he makes tea. He keeps his hands below the counter while Greg sits on the stool across from him.

“When do you leave?” He feels relief at the even cadence of his voice.

“I haven’t bought a ticket out, yet.” Greg answers.

Mycroft arches a brow at him.

Greg shrugs. “I’ve had time coming to me. Close enough to Christmas to take an extended winter holiday. A real one.”

“How fortuitous.” Mycroft frowns. Surely Anthea and Sherlock had plotted this out. “Well, I’m sure you’ll have others with which to spend it with, now that you have quenched your curiosity and that of every meddlesome person of my acquaintance.”

Greg chuckles. The sound makes Mycroft’s stomach flip. “Now you sound like Sherlock.”

The kettle whistles. Mycroft takes a breath before pouring the tea.

Greg accepts his cup. “Myc, you know as well as I do that I’ve no family to spend the season with. I’ve never been to Canada, though, so I didn’t mind the all-expenses paid vacation on Her Majesty’s coffers.”

Ah.

“My name is Mycroft, and you can inform Lady Smallwood that I am _fine_.” Mycroft bites out.

Greg glances at Mycroft’s jumper and chinos and back at his face. “I’m sure you’re fine. I told her so. You are Mycroft Holmes, after all.”

Mycroft turns back to the stove. He can’t tell if the inspector is teasing him or not. “You may stay in the second bedroom on the left. I have the master. Do not enter the room in the back. It would be my pleasure to drive you to the airport tomorrow.”

 

* * *

 

Greg brings food with him in the bags, and fills the refrigerator. Then he sets about making a simple pasta dish for dinner. Mycroft couldn’t remember his last, proper meal, and begrudgingly thanks the man for some real food.

“You’re looking a bit thin, mate.” Greg says. “Have another helping.”

Mycroft bristles at being told what to do, and at being called ‘mate.’ He does not avail himself of another helping.

He washes the dinner dishes, telling Greg to occupy himself elsewhere in a tone Greg could not argue. Out the window, the snow falls in the porchlight. Mycroft feels his breathing even out as he watches the snow float down and settle on the ground, building upward. Light and lovely could quickly turn to suffocating and dangerous, he remembers.

“I’m out for a cigarette. Care to join me?” Greg stands in the doorway of the kitchen. His jaw sets in a way Mycroft usually sees in relationship to Sherlock after a bout of shenanigans. He dries his hands on the towel, and follows Greg out onto the deck, taking his coat with him.

Greg lights two cigarettes in his mouth with the lighter - _snick snick_ \- and hands one to Mycroft. Mycroft doesn’t protest at the thought of Greg’s saliva touching his cigarette.

The inspector draws in a deep drag, holds it, and exhales. Mycroft watches the silvery dance of smoke in the illumination of the porchlight. He thinks of how he might capture that gray. Perhaps adding red with its complement green, lightened with white. He’ll test it later.

Greg sticks his cigarette in his mouth and tucks his hands into the pockets of his parka. “Now, Mycroft, we’ve been working together for a long time, yeah?”

The cadmium-orange-mixed-with-yellow glow of the cigarette end almost distracts Mycroft, who then looks down at his sleeve and pretends to pluck something from it.

“The way I figure it, we’ve done a lot of favors for one another over the years,” Greg continues. “It’s what we do, both of us keeping London safe in our own way.” He blows smoke out the corner of his mouth. “Keeping Sherlock safe, too.”

Mycroft huffs out a cloud of smoke. “Yes, Detective Inspector.”

“Greg.”

Mycroft rolls his eyes.

“I can’t see your face with your back to the light, but I know you just rolled those eyes.” Greg is almost smiling, the cigarette hanging from his lip. “I don’t think you know how much I admire you, Mycroft.”

Mycroft scoffs.

“That’s okay, you don’t have to believe me. You could just do that thing that you and Sherlock do to tell that I’m serious, though.”

Mycroft pointedly avoids looking at the other man.

“Listen, I’m here for you. It’s been a shit time. I wouldn’t have come all this way if I didn’t...if I didn’t care at least a little.” His voice has gone rougher than usual.

Mycroft stiffens and turns his gaze at the man. “Your concern isn’t necessary, Detective Inspector.”

“Greg.” He removes the cigarette, looking down at the deck. “And you don’t have to do this alone.”

Mycroft straightens up and can’t help but snarl. “I’m _choosing_ to be alone, Detective Inspector. And what I am choosing to do with my time alone is none of anyone’s concern, least of all yours. Kindly get any misled saviour notion out of your head, and desist with this inanity at once.” He throws his cigarette onto the snow-covered deck and stomps back toward the sliding doors.

“One last thing,” Greg calls out.

Mycroft draws himself up and faces the inspector.

Greg grins. “Does the hot tub work? I figure if this is my one night out here…”

Mycroft scowls.

 

* * *

 

While surveillance is a key component in his career, he isn’t working at the moment. He feels unusually uneasy about standing by the window and looking below on the hot tub. Greg Lestrade has settled into the water, leaning his head back onto a headrest, a beer in one hand and a cigarette in the other. Snowflakes melt in the air above the water.

If Mycroft painted the inspector’s hair, he would try raw umber and ultramarine blue mixed with a dab of mars black. It would create a kind of pewter color that he would streak with zinc white. The inspector’s eye color would start with the hue of raw umber, or maybe van dyke brown. He might test it later.

 

* * *

 

He doesn’t sleep that night. Instead, he stays in the studio. He paces between the canvases. He starts two new paintings, one that tries to capture the ephemeral quality of smoke, and the other a portrait that certainly smacks of a certain someone.

Catching the right bend in the light is challenging. The painter has to consider the source, and therefore the direction of the light as it hits the objects. But the trickier parts are the areas of reflected light - light that bounces from one object to another, reaching even the shadow areas.

 

* * *

 

He is bent over the studio table, sketching a third painting when a light _tap_ on the door interrupts his process.

“Eh, Mycroft?” Lestrade’s voice is muffled.

Mycroft opens the door and slips out into the hallway, hiding the view into his studio.

“Look out a window this morning?” Greg asks.

Mycroft strides to the window in the hallway.

White. White everywhere. Striking, titanium white with shades of payne’s gray and lavender.

It’s still coming down.

“No,” Mycroft chokes.

“Ah, it’ll be okay. You can drive me tomorrow.”

“The roads won’t be paved for some time.”

“Don’t sound too unhappy. I might take offense.” Greg pushes past him and into the hallway bathroom.

 

* * *

 

Mycroft confirms that Greg’s eyes are wet pools of raw umber. Those eyes follow him when Mycroft enters the room. It makes something rattle around inside him and he feels like an animal on display at a zoo, a tiger pacing the length of one side, all kinetic energy tightly wound beneath fur and muscle and ligaments that would snap if stretched too far.

Greg keeps himself busy by preparing meals for both of them. He maintains the fire, and he reads. Mycroft paces.

 

* * *

 

“I know you hate my being here, Mycroft.” Greg says. “But maybe we can make a night of it. I saw the liquor cabinet. Why not have some drinks and play a game of cards?”

Mycroft leaves the room without speaking. He paces the length of hallway upstairs instead.

 

* * *

 

Greg is poring through the shelves in the lounge when Mycroft enters an hour later.

Greg pulls down a colorful batik bag, and opens the string to peer inside. “Hey, it’s a mancala set!” He brightens. “My ex-boyfriend taught me to play. Want to try it out?”

Mycroft feels something twist inside him as he halts. He lifts his gaze to Greg’s face.

Greg holds up the bag and shakes it - _rattle rattle_. Still smiling.

Mycroft’s mouth opens and closes; feelings he didn’t know he had rush his head and bang behind his ribs, a flashing urgency of confusion and want and _how did I not know_.

Is it important?

It can’t be.

Mycroft glares at Greg, and starts to leave the room.

“You know what? Fuck you.”

The words hit him in the chest. He gasps, his hands held behind his back, his lungs finding air to be scarce. He turns, slowly, to see Greg standing there with the mancala set in one hand, and his other a balled fist.

“I know this isn’t what you wanted. I know you hate yourself right now. Sherlock told me what happened there, and Smallwood gave me some watered down version of it, but what happened was not your fault. Everything we do in life has risk, and you Holmeses take some big risks. You’re bound to lose every once in a while. And when you risk big and you lose, you lose big.”

“What the hell do you know about it?” Mycroft snaps, slashing one arm down as if throwing a gauntlet. “I’ve lost everything!”

“I know what it’s like to lose everything!” Greg’s face contorts in anger. “Back when you and Sherlock faked his death! I’d lost my wife, and then I lost my job. You just saw some doormat copper you could use to keep your baby brother entertained. You didn’t even call me, Mycroft. You didn’t even speak to me again until Sherlock popped up like it were nothing, and before that you didn’t even acknowledge the work I’d done to keep him out of trouble and off drugs.”

They are squared off, facing one another with shoulders tense. Mycroft realizes his hands have become fists, too.

“I can’t...I can’t, and if I can’t…” Mycroft watches his own fists unfurl. “You’re right. You should have been commended for your part. I ensured your reinstatement at Scotland Yard, but I should have extended my personal gratitude more often. It matters little, now.”

“It matters to me.”

Mycroft drops his hands to his side and looks at Greg. “Of course. Of course it does. Detective Inspector, thank you.”

“Greg.” His chin drops to his chest. “Mycroft, I like you and Sherlock. I think you do a lot of good in the world, even if you’re both impossible-”

“You’re more than either of us deserve.” Mycroft balls his hands again. “Thank you for reminding me of my manners. I shall retire, now.”

Greg doesn’t respond.

 

* * *

 

Mycroft lays in his bed. It’s 8 pm, and he’s exhausted. He stares through the window panes limned with moonlight. The sky makes him think of pthalo blue, a favorite hue of his.

 

* * *

 

This time, he stands ankle-deep in water at the bottom of the well. A small child with no face stands beside him. Above, Sherlock glares, pointing the gun at Mycroft’s heart. John Watson’s high-pitched giggle reverberates around the walls of the well. Ultramarine blue and lamp black in the stone, and Sherlock’s viridian eyes.

The gun erupts, and the child beside him is Eurus, laughing as the blood drains from Mycroft’s body.

 

* * *

 

“Mycroft!” Someone is shaking him.

“Greg?” His throat feels hoarse.

The lamp on the nightstand comes on, and Mycroft blinks in its glare.

“Christ, I thought you were getting murdered.”

Mycroft thinks of Eurus with her glacier blue eyes.

Raw umber before him. Strong, warm hands on his shoulder and arm.

“Greg,” he murmurs. He doesn’t know what to say or how to ask.

The man crawls onto the bed, laying atop the covers. “Go back to sleep. I’ll be here.”

A _click_ of the lamp, and darkness.

Mycroft nestles into the blankets, listening to the soft breathing of Greg Lestrade.

 

* * *

 

He wakes up alone, but for the first time in months, he feels almost rested.

 

* * *

 

There’s a _clatter_ and a _thud_ in the downstairs hallway. Mycroft finds Greg hauling two black bags the size of tennis rackets out of the depths of the closet.

“Look, snowshoes!” The man’s smile is infectious. “Let’s try them out!”

Mycroft feels too bone-weary to deny him. He goes back to his room, pulls on an extra jumper and meets the man at the back door where his snow boots sit. They strap into the snowshoes on the back porch and begin the trek down the mountain slope.

 

* * *

 

After walking only a few minutes, Mycroft finds himself out of breath and deeply immersed in the landscape. Greg is smiling when he looks back at him as he breaks the trail. Mycroft watches Greg as much as he views their surroundings.

The early morning fog is thick, but they keep the artificial light from the chalet in view. The fragrance of Ponderosa pine, crisp snow, and cold air fills their lungs. The wind is still. The effect is eerie.

Greg pauses in the _crunch crunch_ of breaking the trail. He turns one way and then the other. Mycroft pauses a couple feet behind him.

Then, he hears it.

What sounds like a _snort_ , then a light _crunch_ of crushed snow, followed by another _crunch_.

Greg moves closer to Mycroft, crunch, who holds his breath. The fog hangs heavy around them.

 _Crunch. Snort._ Then _crunch_ and _crunch_. Another soft _snort_ as the outline of a large, shaggy animal comes into view.

“Holy christ,” Greg whispers.

“Elk,” Mycroft says in a soft voice.

The buck raises his head, a tremendous rack creating a shadowy halo above two ears.

He stands mere feet away.

Mycroft remembers that this animal is no tame ungulate. One of them could end up gored and bleeding quinacridone red on the snow. There’s no safe way down the mountain, and no one can reach them. Mycroft Holmes could become a casualty in an interspecies misunderstanding of territory.

So could Greg Lestrade.

His heart _thumps_ inside his chest.

As the fear mounts, so does his sense of awe. The bull could never top Mycroft’s accomplishments, but what did that matter? The dumb beast doesn’t care. He lives moment by moment, as Mycroft has been striving to do in an effort to numb himself over the past couple weeks. Over the past months if he were honest. But the elk isn’t trying to numb himself; he’s living as elk live.

The bull elk stares down at them. The fog is thinning, and the sky grows lighter. Greg touches the sleeve of Mycroft’s parka. The bull’s head follows the movement, then turns to the side. Mycroft releases a breath as the massive animal moves away.

The fog is lifting, but Mycroft’s gaze remains rooted to where the bull had stood.

“Mycroft,” Greg is holding his arm. “Look.”

Mycroft looks to where Greg indicates. On the lower slope of their portion of the mountain are tens, perhaps hundreds, of elk. The dark shapes become clearer as the sun grows brighter and the fog dissipates. They move in one direction, the snow turning to a soft shade of mauve in the changing light.

“It’s amazing,” Greg says, and his voice trembles.

Mycroft lifts his eyes to the sky. The clouds are gilded in gold as they reveal the morning sun.

This cycle, this spinning of the earth and the east-west path of the sun and the animals that survive even in the face of a relentless and barren winter cold, it feels important. The forces of nature are impersonal, but they are ever-changing and ever-persistent; they will remain truths even after Mycroft is gone. All his games, all the political posturing and the consolidation of power and the moving of pieces across a live-action game of Risk, it will all crumble into nothingness, and still animals will eat and fuck and live their lives in relative peace until a predator or starvation overtakes them. Mountains on one side of the world will grow as mountains on another side wane. Still the planet will spin, and perhaps humans will make it, perhaps not. Mycroft could declare it a series of meaningless processes framed by the inescapable laws of nature, but…

 _But_. He realizes that one can ascribe as much or as little meaning as one wants, and this, this is a powerful tool that no one can take away from him.

The realization hits him with a wonder he has never felt, and inside, something large and important _cracks._

Mycroft turns back to the house and ignoring the looping, meandering trail that Greg has created in his boyish delight, he breaks across the snow in a straight line, running as well as one can in a set of snowshoes.

He can hear Greg behind him, huffing and saying his name.

Mycroft throws open the door, and yanks his outerwear off, snowshoes and boots and coat and all. He pitches the scarf and the gloves on the floor behind him as he heads up the stairs and down the hall to the back room.

He leaves the door open behind him, and Greg follows. Mycroft grabs a canvas, and begins sketching the silhouette of the bull elk that has changed everything.

Greg is quiet as he works. After a few moments, Mycroft hears him step inside the room, and then a small _gasp_.

He looks. Greg is holding a canvas. His face is alight as he looks at Mycroft and shows him the face of the painting. “That me?”

Mycroft, perched on the ground, nods.

Greg stares at the painting. His gaze is soft. “No one’s ever painted me before.”

Mycroft stands and walks over to Greg so that their bodies face each other, standing about a foot apart. “You...are worthy of a painting.” His heart riots in his chest.

Greg’s lips are parted and his eyes are wide. Mycroft can feel the heat between their bodies.

“Mycroft,” Greg finally says in a voice that is low and gravelly.

Mycroft smiles. “You are worthy of a thousand paintings.”

“Only if you paint them. These,” Greg gestures around the room, though his eyes never leave Mycroft’s, “are incredible. You, are incredible.”

 

* * *

 

That night, they sit on the sofa before the fire. Mycroft has been there for most of the day already, thinking over the events of his life: Sherlock, Eurus, Uncle Rudy, his parents, his duty to England, his isolation, Sherrinford… He is cataloging and reorganizing and archiving memories and feelings as they arise. He might not be the architect of the world around him, but he can be an architect to some extent of his own life.

Greg hands him a tumbler of whiskey. Mycroft lets his eyes slide over the other man’s thick-fingered hands and olive-skinned forearms. Christmas carols play low in the background from the stereo.

Greg sits close to him on the sofa. His coffee-colored eyes watch Mycroft, who finally turns to face him.

Those dark umber eyes smolder in the firelight, and Mycroft feels his heart arrest in that gaze. Greg brings a palm to Mycroft’s cheek, and then his hand to the other side, one finger tracing the seam of Mycroft’s mouth. He moves slowly. His face is a study in chiaroscuro.

Mycroft’s insides feel like they are about to tumble to the outside in a landslide of forsaken wants, but he holds still in the other man’s hands.

Greg leans forward, pressing his mouth against Mycroft’s.

Mycroft’s hands move of their own accord, placing themselves, one on Greg’s bicep, and the other on Greg’s shoulder.

They part, and their eyes hold. Greg smiles and leans in again. This time, their tongues slide together, and heat sparks down Mycroft’s spine and pools in his groin.

When they stop, Greg shifts closer and Mycroft holds him tightly. Greg pets his softly curling hair and nuzzles his beard. “You know I’ve a bit of a thing for you, Mycroft.”

Mycroft starts. “Really?”

“Yeah. You’re a toff, but I think that makes it more fun to rumple you a bit, take you by surprise, have my wicked way with you.” His eyes twinkle.

“You surprise me.”

Greg snuggles closer. “When you get back to England, can I see you?”

Mycroft rests his chin atop Greg’s head, inhaling the earthy scent of his hair and shampoo. “Yes. I can’t say it’ll be easy, Greg-”

“Oh, I know, you’ve got your job and all, and I know you’re more important than you make yourself out to be-”

“I’m not sure the job will be there when I get back. I’m not sure I want the job to be there when I get back.”

Greg lifts his head from Mycroft’s chest to look him in the eye. “For real?”

Mycroft nods. “There are, perhaps, better ways to cultivate meaning in my life.”

Their hands meet and their fingers interlace. “Like your art?”

“That might be one,” Mycroft says.

Greg sighs, and in it, Mycroft can hear contentment.

“Happy Christmas, My.”

“Happy Christmas, Greg.”

And like that, Mycroft knows what it means to capture light.

 

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> I originally wrote this story in past tense, and then found myself wanting to know what it was like in present tense. I love both. Present tense won out because my best friend read both versions and liked this one better, so thank you BFF!
> 
> I can be found dabbling in the [ r/Mystrade space ](https://www.reddit.com/r/Mystrade/), but also on [tumblr](https://vulpesmellifera.tumblr.com), [Twitter](https://twitter.com/vulpesmellifera), [Pillowfort](https://www.pillowfort.io/Vulpesmellifera), and [Dreamwidth](https://vulpesmellifera.dreamwidth.org/)! (Thanks to the tumblr stupidity, I am now all over the place, lol. Join me!)


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